Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/338

324 of reformed religion be might make, such proceedings as these stamped them as pretences, hollow, and even impious, in the minds of the public.

The feeling which began out of doors had now made its way into the very heart of the Council. Somerset's friends were silenced, his enemies spoke out boldly. During the month of September there were great contentions in the Council; and, by the beginning of October, the two parties were ranged in hostile attitudes under their heads. Warwick and his followers met at Ely Place; the Protector was at Hampton Court, where he had the king. On the 5th of October, Somerset, in the king's name, sent the Secretary of the Council to know why the lords were assembling themselves in that manner, and commanding them, if they had anything to lay before him, to come before him peaceably and loyalty. When this message was dispatched, Somerset, fearful of the manner in which this summons might be complied with, ordered the armour to be brought down out of the armoury at Hampton Court, sufficient for 500 men, in order to arm his followers, and had the doors barricaded, and people fetched in for the defence.

But, instead of coming, Warwick and his party ordered the Lieutenant of the Tower, and the Lord Mayor and aldermen, to be summoned, who duly attended and proffered their obedience. They then dispatched letters to the nobility and gentry in different parts of the kingdom, informing them of their doings and the motives for it. Alarmed at this aspect of affairs, Somerset conveyed the king to Windsor, under escort of 500 men; Cranmer and Sir William Paget alone, of all the Council, accompanying them. King Edward, in his journal, says, "The lords sat in open places of London, calling for gentlemen before them, and declaring the causes of accusation of the Lord Protector, and caused the same to be proclaimed. After which time few came to Windsor, but only mine own men of the guard, whom the lords willed, fearing the rage of the people so lately quieted. The began the Protector to treat by letters, sending Sir Philip Hoby, lately come from his embassage in Flanders, to see to his family, who brought on his return a letter to the Protector, very gentle, which he delivered to him; another to me, another to my house, to declare his faults, ambition, vain-glory, entering into rash wars in my youth, negligent looking on Newhaven, enriching himself of my treasure, following of his own opinion, and doing all by his own authority."



Somerset at first resolved to defend himself by arms; he surrounded himself with troops, and wrote to Lord Russell to hasten up out of the west, where he yet remained, with all the power that he could. But his heart failed him, and the next day he wrote to the lords of the Council, stating that if they meant no harm to the Royal person, the king was prepared to hear anything which they desired to lay before him. This sudden evidence of timidity, after a show of preparations for resistance, at once opened the eyes of the Council to the fact that the Protector succumbed before them. They treated his letter with contempt, giving it no answer, but proceeded to the house of the Lord Mayor, whence they issued a proclamation accusing him of evil and malicious designs, of being the occasion of the late insurrection, of the losses in France, his arrogance and vain-glory, especially as shown in his sumptuous and costly buildings during the king's troubles at home and abroad, leaving his majesty's soldiers unpaid, sowing dissension betwixt the nobles and gentlemen and the Commons, with various other misdemeanours, for which they pronounced him a great traitor, and called upon the Lords and Commons to aid them in removing him from the king.

Somerset, growing more faint-hearted at these proceedings, then made a vain appeal to Warwick, reminding